Title: Now That The Dawn Has Come

Author: Jedi Buttercup

Rating: R/Mature; language and canon-typical violence

Disclaimer: The words are mine; the world is not.

Summary: In which Tom and Pope undertake to save the human race. Starting with each other. And Charleston.

Fandom: Falling Skies

Notes: A sequel to "Waiting for the Dawn", a Falling Skies Season 3 divergence story. Contains slash between two angsty, foul-mouthed, conflicted survivors of an alien apocalypse, and chronicles the shifting evolution of their family as they do their best to save Earth from the Espheni threat. (Because canon's version ... could have used a little applied logic.)

Title and summary borrowed once again from the Popol Vuh, specifically the Dennis Tedlock translation. Xibalba (as in the title of episode 3.9, "Journey to Xibalba") literally means "The Place of Fear", the name of the Mayan underworld, and I found other plot-provoking things in the text as well. (If you're not familiar with the Mayan story of creation, I do recommend it.) Written for the 2016 Extreme Big Bang; originally posted to DW on July 23, 2016.

"The dawn has approached, preparations have been made, and morning has come for the provider, the nurturer, born in the light, begotten in light. Morning has come for humankind, for the people of the face of the earth."
— Popul Vuh, Part Four

"So I suppose this is the part where I do the walk of shame from the President's quarters," a wry voice drawled somewhere in the darkness beyond Tom's closed eyelids. "Huh, I wonder if that's a first for Charleston? Maybe we shoulda done this in that not-so-Oval Office of yours, then. Just for the principle of the thing."

Tom cracked open his eyes, stretching slowly on the salvaged mattress as he gave up the fight to stay asleep, and pressed the back of a hand to his mouth to cover a yawn. Then he glanced toward the opaque glass doors of his apartment, a converted storefront in the underground mall currently serving as the central hub of the post-apocalyptic metropolis of Charleston, SC. He was glad he already had an excuse for his toes to be curling, because the view before him was extremely appealing: long lines of lean muscle, from calf to posterior thigh to gluteus maximus, disappearing inch by inch into a snug pair of worn blue jeans.

John was facing toward the doors, back still bare but for the dark lines of his tattoos and a few reddish scars, fading souvenirs of the last few years' worth of battles against the alien invaders. Tom traced his gaze down the valley of the man's spine, appreciating the sight, and marveled at how different his life had become from what it had been three years ago- or even one. It had been a long damn time since he'd had the energy, not to mention the luxury, to lie around and simply take pleasure in this kind of moment; it would be a pity to waste it.

"Calling it a walk of shame implies we've done something wrong, Pope," he replied, a warm note of teasing underlying the words. "There's just one thing ... no, two things wrong with that."

"Only two?" John replied, voice thick with skepticism. He paused his reverse striptease with the jeans up but still unbuttoned, turning to look over his shoulder at Tom. Dark eyes lit with amusement under a disheveled fall of slightly wavy, shoulder-length dark hair. "Pray, enlighten me, good Professor."

"For one, as you so often remind me, I'm the leader around here. That means I'm the one that makes the rules ... and under my rules, if it doesn't hurt another human being or aid the Espheni, what's the point of worrying about it?" Tom stirred further, reaching his arms back to link his fingers behind his head as he stifled another yawn. "And two — that would imply that we're done. What the hell time is it, anyway? Why don't you forget about getting dressed and come back to bed."

John's grin was smug as he turned fully to face him, more than a little strut in his stance. But there was a certain degree of hackles-up wariness in his posture, too. "Seems a little quick to be playing house, don't you think?"

Sometimes, he reminded Tom of a cat not quite convinced of his welcome. He supposed it would take all those old bad habits — and misconceptions of each other — a little more than three weeks to fully break. Still.

"Don't know if you noticed, but the world sort of ended a few years back. And somehow, a history professor from Boston ended up the President — excuse me, Governor, I keep forgetting — of the biggest bunch of free Americans left. All five thousand or so of us. We don't exactly have time to play at anything." Tom smirked to take the seriousness out of the words. "But who's talking about moving in, anyway? I just don't want to get up yet, and there's a few hours left 'til they lay out the canned pears and oatmeal in the cafeteria."

"All right, all right. Sold." John's grin widened as he strolled back to the bed, putting a knee up on the mattress to lean over for a bristly good-morning kiss. Neither of them had brushed their teeth since the day before, but Tom barely even noticed; they might be able to afford to shower and do laundry on a daily rather than weekly or even monthly basis now, but that kind of thing hardly registered after all the months the Second Massachusetts Militia had spent on the road. While their mouths were occupied, Tom slid his hands around John's flanks, slipping one hand down under the still-loose waistband of the jeans to cop a feel; whatever else you could say about the post-apocalyptic warrior lifestyle, it had a way of producing really fit people.

Things were just beginning to get really interesting when the door swung open without warning. Two years of near-constant war had rewritten a lot more of his instincts than just his hygiene tolerances; Tom was pulling his free hand back to reach for the handgun stashed under the mattress before the identity of the intruder even registered, and he wasn't sure he wanted to know where Pope had been keeping the weapon that suddenly filled the hand not supporting his weight. Both of them immediately turned to aim —

—straight into the face of Tom's eldest, who gaped in comically exaggerated horror for a long moment before pointedly jerking his gaze off to one side and shutting the door behind him.

"Oh, God; I did not need to see that," Hal sputtered. "Dad, what the hell!"

Tom sighed, slumping back against the sheets, and removed his other hand from the back of Pope's jeans. John rolled his eyes as he lowered his Peacemaker, then shifted his weight backwards off the bed to gingerly do up his fly with his free hand. Fortunately, he didn't move out of Hal's line of sight; Tom was wearing a lot less than John was, and not feeling particularly exhibitionist at the moment. Especially not in front of one of his chief military aides ... who just so happened to also be his nineteen-year-old son.

"Shouldn't that be my question?" he replied, wearily. "Seriously, Hal. I thought you learned your lesson years ago about barging into my room in the middle of the night." He'd only walked in on Tom and Rebecca once as a kid, but that had been more than enough for the lesson to sink in.

"First of all," Hal said gruffly to the wall, nose wrinkled, "it's more like the end of the night. And second — so sue me, I saw Anne in the hall on the way over and just plain forgot that didn't necessarily mean you were sleeping alone anymore. Which — since when aren't you sleeping alone anymore?"

"Since — well, tonight, as if that's any of your business. So thanks for that, Junior," John replied for them both, stooping to pick a pair of faded boxers up off the floor and toss them in Tom's direction. "I trust your reasons for interrupting are suitably dire?"

"Uh — yeah. Sorry," Hal cleared his throat and assumed an approximation of the at-ease stance — probably learned from Dan Weaver, who'd done as much parenting of Tom's boys as he had since they'd left Boston. An unavoidable side-effect of Tom's status as one of the Espheni's favorite chewtoys. "You decent yet, Dad?"

Tom thrust his legs over the edge of the bed as he finished settling the boxers around his waist, then bent to snag his own trousers off the floor. They were slightly better quality than anything found in John's wardrobe — Tom's civilian second, Marina Peralta, had ideas about what the Man in Charge should look like when he wasn't in the field, and he'd found it easier to give in than fight her on it — but still nothing that couldn't have been found at a mall, back in the day. Which, he supposed, was only appropriate considering the setting.

"Just about — what's going on?" he asked as he pulled on the trousers.

Hal cast a wary glance over his shoulder, then relaxed a little as he turned to give his report. "You have a visitor. No idea why he came in the middle of the night, but if I had to guess, he wanted as few people as possible to know he was here. Which was a smart move, if you ask me."

"Why's that?" Tom's brow wrinkled as he caught the shirt John tossed him, then hastily shrugged it on, waving off the waistcoat John picked up next. Like hell he was going to don the whole outfit in the middle of the night; whoever the visitor was would just have to deal with the informal version of their leader.

"Considering it's Cochise," Hal replied, expression as grim as the tone of his voice.

Tom paused in the middle of doing up his shirt buttons, exchanging a wary glance with John. It was partly by John's — and Dan's — advice that the human fighters had been prepared for the Volm to betray their alliance as soon as the Espheni defense grid came down; Tom had arranged to have Dr. Kadar and a few helpers modify a significant percentage of their weaponry with Volm tech, unbeknownst to Cochise, and later evacuated most of their fighters from the battlefield in Jacksonville before Cochise's father, Waschak-cha'ab, could trap them with his 'round up all the humans and send them to Brazil' plan. Neither Cochise nor any of the twenty or so other Volm who'd been quartered in their bunker outside Charleston had been seen since.

Tom liked Cochise a great deal; he was a very relatable person, for an alien. And he thought Cochise had genuinely thought of him as a friend, as well. But they had separate duties and allegiances, and ultimately loyalty to their individual species had won out. What did it mean that he'd chosen to come back now?

"Just Cochise?" he asked his son.

Hal nodded. "Yup. He wouldn't say anything to the patrol that brought him in; just asked to speak with you."

Tom blew out a breath, then nodded and stood, thumbing the last button into place. "John, you see where my boots ended up?"

"Over by the door, I think," John replied, distractedly. He was already most of the way dressed himself, sliding his own boots back on and stomping his feet to settle them.

"You don't need to come with, you know," Tom quirked a smile at him. "Bed's still yours, if you want to catch a couple more hours before breakfast with your daughter."

John raised both his eyebrows at him, though the corner of his mouth had curved up automatically at the mention of Tanya. She was bunking with Lourdes at the moment — John had figured his digs up in Popetown were maybe not the best environment to host a teenage girl, and the junior doctor appreciated having a roommate there to break her out of the terrible nightmares she'd suffered since her experiences under Espheni mind control — but they usually ate at least one meal together a day when possible, and breakfast was easiest to arrange.

"Your alien boyfriend finally deigns to pay a visit, and you think I don't want to be there? Pull the other one, Professor, it's got bells on."

Tom just shook his head at him, still smiling, as he snagged the boots and located a pair of clean socks. Then he turned back to his son at the sound of a disbelieving snort. "Got something else to say, Hal?"

"Oh; no. It's just ... I guess it was naïve of me to think that you guys would stop bickering, now that you're doing ... whatever it is you're doing. But since it's Pope we're talking about, I probably shouldn't be surprised."

"Aw, c'mon, kid. Sometimes that's half the fun," John leered at him. "You can't tell me your relationship with Maggie is always smooth as silk, 'cause if you do, I'll call you a liar."

"Hey. I can't control what you do with my dad, but you don't talk about Maggie, all right?" Hal pointed a finger at him, bristling at the remark.

Tom sighed. He'd never expected his current choice of partner to go over smoothly with most of his family, but there was a limit to what he'd put up with at such an ungodly hour. He retrieved his rifle, slinging the strap over his back, then stepped between Hal and John and gestured toward the door. "You said Cochise was waiting?"

Hal gave John one last frustrated glare, then refocused on his father. "Yes, sir. Colonel Weaver had the watch; the patrol brought Cochise to him, and he parked him in a conference room. This way." He turned to push the opaque doors open again, then nodded to the sentry on duty as he held it for Tom to follow.

"So much for a relaxing start to the day," Tom muttered under his breath as he crossed the threshold.

"Not like I didn't know what I was getting myself into with you, Professor," John replied dryly, taking up station beside him. "But I reserve the right to snag an hour of your schedule later on, to make it up to me."

"Wait — that's supposed to be a favor to you?" Tom glanced over, sharing a smirk with him.

The light mood didn't last, though; a moment later they were approaching the conference room, and Tom felt the heavy hand of the war press down on him again. They'd had three weeks of peace; but he'd never supposed their victory in Jacksonville had been any more than a beginning. Now the outside world was pushing its way back in, and he could only pray they were ready to meet it.

Hal pushed open the door with a nod; Tom nodded back, then squared his shoulders and stepped through.

He took in the situation inside the conference room at a glance: Cochise standing stiffly near the chalkboard, turning to blink big liquid eyes in Tom's direction; a uniformed guard in the corner, rifle unshipped but aimed down near Cochise's feet; a crate of some kind on the table, about half a yard on a side and obviously of Volm make; and Colonel Weaver, seated in front of the crate, a distrusting frown on his face as he stared at Cochise. None of them looked particularly happy to be there.

Dan looked back over his shoulder at the sound of the door opening, then nodded a greeting to Tom and got to his feet. His eyes skipped slightly past him to catch briefly on Pope, but other than a slight deepening of the frown, he chose to ignore the elephant in the room and got right to the point. "Sorry to wake you, Mr. President, but I thought you might find this important enough to interrupt your ... rest."

Tom took his cue from Dan's manner and nodded formally back to him, approaching to stand at his shoulder near the table. "I do, Colonel Weaver; thank you. Cochise, it's good to see you, my friend."

Cochise inclined his head in acknowledgement, but his expression didn't warm, even by Volm standards. They weren't unemotional Vulcans, but they had genetically engineered themselves into a warrior species over the course of their own conflict with the Espheni; the resulting cultural pressures had shaped them into a brusque, pragmatic people in general. Cochise was usually more of an outlier, though; Tom was more used to friendly behavior from him, and the difference was unsettling.

"You as well, Professor. Though I fear you will — I believe the phrase is, change your tune — when you have heard the news I bring."

"What a surprise," John muttered under his breath, pulling out a chair on Dan's other side to turn it around and drop into a seated position, arms crossed over the back.

Tom didn't outwardly react, though an apprehensive chill swept through him. He quickly sent Hal back to his duties and dismissed the guard — no need for the rest of the conversation to join the Charleston information chain just yet — before replying obliquely. "I was worried that your father had ordered you to break contact with us when you didn't return to Charleston after his ship arrived."

He'd seen enough of the Volm Commander to be fairly certain Cochise's father wouldn't try ordering the human survivors rounded up and relocated again ... but he'd also seen enough to know that it was probably the inconvenience involved more than an increase in respect that dissuaded him from doing so. He clearly hadn't thought much of Tom and his people, or any humans, for that matter. Once again, Tom had been reminded of the behavior of the European colonists when they'd first arrived in America, and how poorly that had worked out for the natives. Who knew what else Waschak-cha'ab might do in the name of defeating the Espheni without considering the needs and desires of those who actually lived on the planet, first?

"It had been long since we had seen one another, and there was much news to exchange," Cochise replied. "Also, the behavior of the Espheni in respect to this world ... did not match my father's expectations from prior campaigns, and after our first few engagements he relied much upon my experiences to inform his strategies."

"That's an awful lot of past-tense there, Chief. Would I be correct in assuming that his 'strategies' have recently undergone another drastic change?" John said cynically, drumming his fingers against the back of the chair he'd straddled.

Cochise paused again; and in his peripheral vision, Tom saw Dan throwing a sharp, appraising look at John. "Unfortunately, yes," he finally said. "Earth is not our only battlefront with the Espheni. And prior to his arrival here, my father hid our brood mates and hatchlings — our families — in the Alicante 8 cluster, in the hopes that they would escape notice. They ... did not."

Tom swallowed, realizing instantly where this was going. "You received a distress call. And now you have to defend them, or risk extinction yourselves."

Cochise inclined his head again. "As you say. The majority of the Volm fleet will be departing within twenty-four of your hours."

"So, after all his talk about liberating humans from the yoke of the Espheni, he's just gonna up and abandon the whole deal, huh?" Dan put in, bitterly. "I appreciate the circumstances ... but you realize, they're gonna come down on us even harder after you go. Will you be leaving any forces behind to assist?"

"My father didn't consider you much at all in this decision, I'm afraid," Cochise replied, slumping slightly — a major indicator of negative emotion, coming from a Volm. The ones who'd bothered to study humans before arriving on Earth had picked up some familiar body language to go with their familiar body shape — by far the most humanoid of the various aliens they'd met so far — but it wasn't natural to them. "A mere handful of Volm units will remain, scattered about the globe as small recon teams. I have convinced my father to allow me to lead one of them, but we have been ordered not to engage the enemy under any circumstances. We are merely to observe, and discern the form their next move will take."

"So we're on our own again," Tom concluded. He leaned forward, bracing his hands on the back of a chair, mind racing as he pondered what that would mean for Charleston — and all the other human survivors.

The Espheni had pulled back sharply after the arrival of the Volm; there'd hardly been any visible activity since the grid had been brought down, giving Tom's people a chance to rest and regroup. But if the quiet had only been out of respect for Volm weapons and tactics and not because of the losses they'd suffered, the Espheni would undoubtedly swarm back out of the woodwork the moment the last Volm troopship left the solar system.

"In large part, yes," Cochise replied, his body language perking up suddenly as he continued. "However ... my father failed to limit to whom our observations may be delivered."

"...That's why you're here," Tom realized abruptly, a thread of hope stitching through his mood for the first time since he'd stepped into the conference room.

"Yes. I came as soon as I could, so that you would have time to prepare. And ... to bring you this." He pulled a spherical object from a pocket analogue in his Volm uniform, extending it toward Tom. It had the shiny black surface and glowing blue accents that seemed to be a common feature of Volm military design, and a similar, though smaller, shape to the miniaturized EMP weapons the Volm had given them to use on enemy mechs.

For all his doubts about the true aims of the Volm, Tom had never feared personal harm from Cochise; he automatically reached out to take it, curious what their ally had brought. Dan was there before him, though, leaping up to snag the object out of Cochise's hand. "Whoa, whoa. What is this?"

Cochise blinked curiously at him, but answered gamely. "A secure communications device. Its range is limited, but it will allow me to keep you informed of the movements of the Espheni. There are others in the cache as well, if you wish to give your Dr. Kadar the opportunity to examine their inner workings, in addition to a number of scanners, miniature observation drones, and small munitions such as my father's soldiers will not miss."

John waited for no further invitation to pull the crate over in front of him and begin prying the lid loose with his pocket knife. "Well, now. This I gotta see."

"Why?" Tom asked, ignoring John's enthusiasm as he focused on his alien friend. "Not that I don't appreciate the gift as well ... but a few weeks ago, you seemed to have a very different perspective on allowing us free reign with your technology."

"A few weeks ago, I believed that my father's arrival would render such measures unnecessary, for the Volm have never disseminated our technology before. But you are also unlike any species we have ever encountered, and I have since realized that your refusal to trust fully in anything other than your own strength was not only practical, but prescient. Had we succeeded in our aim of disarming and relocating you and your people to Brazil, you would have been left defenseless and easy prey for the Espheni when our fleet's distress call arrived."

"No shit, Sherlock," John groused, then whistled as he finally pried up the lid and began poking at what he found beneath it. "Nice. Looks like Christmas came a little early this year. I guess I can't say you bubbleheads never did us any favors, even if you do fail at your own logic — I mean, you tell us not to apply human judgment to an alien war, and then you turn right around and try to assign alien reasons to human behavior."

"Indeed, and I have attempted to convey as much to my father," Cochise sighed. "Perhaps when the fleet returns, he will listen. But now I must leave before my patrol group informs him of my absence ... and it may be some time before I am able to meet with you again in person. I expect to have actionable intelligence for you very soon, however; the Espheni will doubtlessly resume their activities as soon as our ships depart the planet."

"We'll appreciate anything you can give us," Dan said grudgingly, still turning the communicator over in his hand. "Even a little will be better than the nothin' we've seen these last few weeks. We may've taken down their defense grid, but there's still over a million of their soldiers out there in the United States alone."

"And who knows how many in the rest of the world," Tom sighed. "There's a long road still ahead of us, despite our recent victories — and for your people as well. I wish the Volm the best in their coming battles with the Espheni." He stepped around the table, meeting Cochise's move toward the door with a shoulder clasp, one of the gestures he'd personally taught Cochise in the months since the Volm scouts' initial arrival.

"You as well. Good luck, Tom Mason," Cochise nodded solemnly, returning the gesture. "One thing I have learned in my many months among your people is that the human spirit is the most powerful weapon on this planet. Please, do not lose hope."

"I won't," Tom promised, and watched as he turned to go. The sentry outside snapped to attention as the door opened again; Dan nodded and gestured quickly to the young man, who nodded affirmation before falling in behind Cochise to trail him back to the surface. Not to protect him; it was still not quite light outside, probably early enough that the alien soldier wouldn't draw the attention of too many resentful human citizens on his way out. But the guard would also report whether he detoured by the empty Volm complex, and what, if anything, he removed from the structure if he did.

The door swung shut again, leaving only the three of them in the room, and Tom sighed. "Well?" he asked.

Dan frowned, brows forming a craggy line; he didn't pretend not to understand. "I'd prefer to run these things by Dr. Kadar first," he said, gesturing to the crate with the hand holding the comm, "but I believe he's telling the truth — at least, as he sees it. I've never fully trusted the Volm, and I trust 'em less since meeting Cochise's father, but whatever he says about aliens not operating by human logic, Cochise himself is pretty easy to read. He feels he's let you down; so he's brought us a going-away present."

"Like I said. Alien boyfriend," John snorted derisively, turning away from the box of Volm tech and crossing his arms over his chest. "And a pretty poor one at that. Abandoning you to the whims of the enemy on his daddy's say-so, as if a preemptive apology and a box of cheap trinkets could hope to make up for that."

"That's enough, Pope," Dan snapped, though his gaze was still on Tom's face, looking for a reaction.

Tom didn't have one to give him, not yet, beyond a crushing sense of weariness. With the Volm gone, the Espheni would have a chance to replace the jammer and fuel plant Charleston's militia had destroyed and appoint a new Overlord for the East Coast. And if that happened, they'd be right back where they started: outnumbered, outgunned, and fighting for their very survival, the horizon line of the war pushed back out beyond their vision.

He took a breath, then met Dan's gaze. "Have we heard from Keystone yet? Did President Hathaway's escort make it back in one piece?"

Dan nodded, slowly. "Got a coded radio confirmation from that Lieutenant Fisher late last night. I was going to put it on your desk first thing."

"Good; then they'll probably be willing to listen if we contact them again. We'll have to word the message carefully; let Hathaway know that the Volm have received word of an Espheni ambush on their loved ones, but they'll be back when the situation is dealt with. In the meantime, any communities who've been exposed in the past and can easily relocate probably should; and for the rest, maximum security measures should be taken."

"And what if the Volm don't come back?" John commented, assuming the role of devil's advocate as always.

"Cochise said they will," Tom replied grimly, "and even if you don't believe that — I do believe that the Volm Commander might slightly value the life of his surviving son, at least enough to come back to retrieve him. And Cochise won't be happy about leaving us in the lurch again."

"Well look at you, all cynical and distrusting. Guess I'm rubbing off on you already," John smirked.

Tom rolled his eyes at the posturing; he knew it had to be partly for Dan's benefit. Not so much out of jealousy, but to further stake his claim, both on Tom and his position as an acknowledged member of the leadership team. "I've always been pragmatic, Pope; I just choose to aim for the best possible outcome, and strategize accordingly. It doesn't cost much, and I've noticed it has a tendency to improve morale."

"So long as we keep trailing along behind you and preparing for the worst," John drawled, gesturing between him and Dan.

"Exactly," Tom smiled blandly at him. "So I'll need you both to start working on a plan for Charleston — get together with General Porter and start figuring out what we can do to strengthen our defenses immediately. We'll need a full check of supplies, especially mech-metal ammunition for our standard weapons, and an update on the status of the energy weapon upgrades. Speaking of which, is the anti-grid weapon still in the railcar shed?"

"Right where we left it after we brought it back from Jacksonville." Dan nodded. "You think we'll need it? It's a little too big and slow to fire to be much use against Beamers, and it makes a really tempting target for Espheni bombs."

"I don't think we can make any assumptions about the makeup of the force the Espheni are likely to hit us with," Tom frowned, starting to pace in the confines of the room. "We've bloodied their nose every time they've struck us here, so far. And they saw in Jacksonville that we had a lot more Volm tech at our disposal than we'd been letting on. The Overlords are smart; they have to know that their best chance at taking Charleston will be to catch us off-guard, and hit us hard from a direction we won't expect. And we know they have bigger ships; we've seen them. It's not designed as an anti-air weapon, but since its function is basically to overload its target with a massively overkill amount of energy, it ought to be effective enough for the purpose."

Dan nodded sharply at that. "We'll make sure it's ready to activate at a moment's notice. You do realize, though, that we don't exactly have a Volm engineer around to fire the thing anymore?"

"Talk to Anne, and Dr. Kadar; between her experience with the interface the Volm use to operate their medical technology, and his experience modifying their weapons technology, I have no doubt they can figure something out," Tom assured him, more confidently than he felt.

"I'll call 'em in after we talk to Porter," Dan agreed. "Dr. Kadar can go over Cochise's gifts then, as well. Especially those drones he mentioned — might be nice to finally get a few of our own aerial shots of the Espheni deployments around Charleston, if we can get those up and running."

"And me?" John raised an eyebrow. "What's my part in all this? Other than checking in with Lyle at the Nest to make sure the gears are still nicely greased in the civvie sector."

Tom grimaced. "I know I kept you in the dark about a lot of the more sensitive decisions last year — and I can't even apologize, because I didn't really trust anyone beyond Dan and Porter, out of necessity, and the Volm, because I knew none of them could be the mole. That's behind us now, though. We're going to need beefed-up patrols, and an experienced sniper with a Volm anti-aircraft rifle along on each of them; we can't count on Cochise's soldiers anymore. That's going to mean a lot of stress on the Berserkers, not to mention the rest of the Second Mass, since they're still the most experienced fighters Charleston has. You've spent more time with them individually lately than I have, or Porter; I'd appreciate you working with Dan on those assignments."

"I'm going to want that Denny kid out on the likeliest approach, just so you know," John narrowed his eyes at him, suddenly all business. "And yeah, it's because of the spikes, but not the way people are gonna think. I'd ask to put your boy Ben there, too, if I didn't already know you'll probably have him liaising with the rebel Skitters. The thing is, the spiked kids are the only ones strong enough to handle those anti-Beamer popguns freehand; even Tector needs to brace himself before he fires one of 'em, and we might not have a lot of time to react."

Always testing him; life was never going to be easy with John Pope. But then again ... one of the many things the last year had taught Tom was that if he was going to be in a position of so much responsibility, he needed someone like that in his life, always willing to push him and call him on his bullshit. To keep him from letting it all go to his head, or making an important decision for all the wrong reasons. John was far from perfect: argumentative, prejudiced, foul-mouthed, and light on impulse control, just to name a few of his less attractive qualities. But he fit Tom — the Tom he was now, more or less the tribal chieftain of a band of post-apocalyptic refugees — like a lost puzzle piece that had finally clicked into place.

"I have confidence in your decisions," Tom said, smile widening at the poorly hidden surprise in John's reaction. Then he rubbed a hand over his beard. "And now ... I'd better see if I can grab a roll out of the kitchens on the way to my office. I'm going to have to meet with Marina first thing, and Dan, you might want to send Jeanne to me, later; she's more or less appointed herself public works officer since the thing with the Liberty Tree, and last time we spoke she had some ideas about starting movie nights back up. Might be a good idea to schedule something for tonight. Oh, and let me know when the sentry that followed Cochise reports back."

"Will do," Dan nodded to him.

"Lunch then?" John prompted him, gruffly.

"Maybe dinner?" Tom winced apologetically. "It's going to be a long day."

"Just don't forget, you owe me," John said. Then he took a long step into Tom's personal space, barely sparing a glance for Dan, and framed Tom's face with a callused hand.

Kissing John was different than kissing Anne; prickly and possessive and with an underlying volatility that had never been part of Tom's relationship with the doctor. He'd cared for her very much; still did, in many ways. But by the end, they'd frustrated and let each other down more than they'd supported each other, held together mostly by their ties to others. If they'd gone on the road again when they'd had the chance, been able to devote more of their time to one another, things might have worked out differently; but they hadn't. Time would tell whether his new relationship with Pope would stay the course. But he hadn't been disappointed yet.

"Okay, okay, enough of that," Dan growled, somewhere in the background. "Let the President get to work, Pope; we got enough to keep us busy right here."

"Yeah, yeah, keep your pants on," John rolled his eyes as he pulled away. "Have a good day, Professor."

"You too, John. Dan."

Bad news from their allies, a prospective attack looming over them, and a pile of administrative paperwork awaiting Tom's attention: just another Sunday in Charleston.

Their vacation was over; it was time to get back to work.

Tom spent the rest of the morning and much of the afternoon clearing his desk of any urgent matter that couldn't wait until after they knew how hard the Espheni were going to come down on them, and taking meetings with everyone involved in the preparations. On the whole, morale wasn't exactly high, but it was holding; people used to thinking a day, a week, or a month ahead at most had barely begun to relax into a more stable peace, and seemed resigned to the fact it had been canceled without much warning.

At least they'd been given twenty-four hours; time enough to call in all their scouting and supply parties, secure vital equipment underground, and run an evac drill or three for the folks who lived up top. Not enough to figure out Cochise's drones, though, unfortunately; the interface on the massive Volm energy weapon needed all of Dr. Kadar's attention, and he hadn't had time to train any apprentices to his level of knowledge on Volm tech just yet.

Maybe that could be a job for Matt one day, if Tom could ever talk his youngest son into paying more attention to his lessons. He'd done well helping Anne's Uncle Scott with the radio, back in Acton, and making mech bullets with John. But he'd become pretty fixated on being a soldier like his dad and his brothers and 'The Colonel' lately. And since the skills he was learning would help keep the nearly-twelve-year-old alive, Tom had decided to let it slide for now.

Jeanne Weaver turned up around lunchtime with a bowl of stew — sent by her father, Tom had no doubt — and a few salvaged movies from her 'life is more than just surviving' project. The war was too raw for him to think alien-invasion sci-fi was a good idea, or an action-thriller monster flick, and the ice-skating romance would probably set half the audience crying or heckling the screen. Not a good idea when things were this tense. The origin story, though: the guy who'd found out the hard way that everything he'd thought was vital in life was actually a luxury, and took what had been done to him to reforge himself as a superhero? Tom thought of Ben, Lexie, Denny, and all those tormented and changed in less visible ways by the war, and gave that one the seal of approval.

Besides. If anyone argued the choice? Might also be a morale-booster to encourage folks to bring back their own favorites to add to the pool, if they ran across a selection of DVDs on a salvage run. They could stand to build up the city's library some more, too.

Provided, of course, the Espheni didn't burn it all down, first. Bullets before food before fuel before entertainment, Tom reminded himself; time to worry about working their way back up Maslow's Hierarchy, later.

"Let's not get ahead of ourselves," he muttered, rubbing a hand over his face as he studied the latest consumables inventory. They could stand about eleven days' siege before going on short rations, it looked like, but no more than that; he could only hope that the Espheni reacted quickly, before he had to worry about sending teams out again.

"Talking to yourself already, I see," a wry voice commented from the doorway.

Tom looked up to meet the smirking gaze of his middle son. "Hmm?"

Ben wrinkled his nose and walked in, shutting the door behind him. "I had a hard enough time wrapping my mind around the fact that you and Pope didn't actually hate each other after you came back from that plane crash. But sleeping with him? Clearly, one of you must've gone mad."

He must've talked to Hal. Tom sighed, dropping the pencil he'd been using to make notes and rubbed at the bridge of his nose. "Look, I know it must be weird for you boys, me being with another man —"

"Ugh, it's not that, Dad," Ben shuddered theatrically. "You really think we didn't know you dated a guy or two in college? Mom was very — um, thorough — when she gave us The Talk. No, it's just — Pope? Really? We kinda thought, when we got Anne and Lexie back ... I mean, Matt was already starting to call her Mom. We're all a little thrown; and Matt even kind of likes Pope when he's not being an asshole."

Yeah, he was in no way ready for that conversation. "It's ... complicated, Ben. And we don't exactly have time for that, right now. I did ask Dan to send you down here for a reason, you know."

"Sure, fine; but I'm going to hold you to that later, okay? You have to admit, it is a little weird." Ben shrugged, crossing his arms over his chest.

"Yeah, well." Tom gave a tired snort. "What about any of our lives has made sense, the last few years? Which brings me to what I wanted to ask you about — the rebel Skitters. They're still camped outside the inhabited area, right? It occurred to me when we were setting up the evac drills that we don't have a plan for them."

Ben's brow furrowed at that, and just like that, Tom's second son was all business: as much an adult as any of Tom's other advisors, despite his age. The war had stolen so much from them all. "Well, you know they're uncomfortable being around so many humans; and it's gotten worse since so many of the other spiked kids went through the procedure to have them removed. They feel like we're not as committed to the alliance as they are."

And justifiably so, Tom had to admit, since even most of the human fighters who worked with them still felt fairly uncomfortable — to put it mildly — around any Skitters, regardless of whether or not they wore the facepaint of the rebellion. It was hard to blame them for it; not a human being still alive hadn't seen a Skitter kill a friend or family member, or take a child to be enslaved by their masters, the Espheni. But that didn't mean they didn't still need the rebels on their side, particularly since the Volm had been forced to pull back.

"You heard Cochise was here this morning?" he asked.

"Yeah, Colonel Weaver filled us in," Ben nodded. "Did he have a message for the rebels?"

"Not ... exactly. But it appears the Volm won't be needing that complex up on the hill any longer. It was built to stand up to bombardment, and there's a big open underground space that they were using to build the grid weapon. I know Skitters like to nest; how many do you think might be able to fit inside, if we turn it over to them?"

Ben's eyes went wide. "Are you serious?"

"Very." Tom leaned forward, bracing his elbows on his desk and lacing his fingers together. "I wasn't sure they'd go for it, since I know they're even warier of the Volm in general than they are of us. But I had a team do a walk-through after Cochise left, and it looks like his people completely stripped the place before we left for Jacksonville. So as far as I'm concerned, they've ceded title, and I think it could be a lot more useful to the rebel Skitters than it would be to us."

Ben put a hand to his mouth and stared at the floor for a moment; then he nodded. "I'll have to talk their leader about it, but ... that's a very generous offer. I think he'll go for it."

"Good. They should have the rest of today, and probably all of tomorrow to investigate and move in, should they choose to do so. But after that — there's no guarantees."

"I understand. I'll tell them." Ben nodded, then hesitated, giving him an awkward smile. "I should be back in time for the movie tonight, though; Jeanne told me. Sounds like fun."

Torn between two duties, the son he'd once hoped would follow in his scholarly footsteps: Tom's heart ached to see it, but he was proud of him all the same. "You know ... you've put a lot of work into building this alliance, Ben. And one of the things this job has taught me is that building things is a lot more difficult than tearing them down. I want you to know I'm proud of you; you've done an amazing job under very trying circumstances. The Volm may have given us the tools to move ahead, but we wouldn't have lasted long enough for them to reach us if hadn't been for your allies. And people will remember which group stuck by us when the going got tough."

Ben's smile grew more genuine, then, and a little bashful; the teenager peeking out from behind the warrior. "Thanks, Dad. I ... that means a lot."

"Now go on; shoo," he said gruffly, waving a hand toward the door. "If I don't finish a little more of this paperwork before dinner, Marina'll have my hide, and if I'm not mistaken you have some good news to impart."

"Yeah. See you later," Ben sketched a grinning salute in his direction and slipped back into the hall.

Soon enough, it was time for his afternoon lesson with Alexis; truthfully, Tom had forgotten to cancel it amid the chaos of the day, but he didn't mind laying down his pen awhile, and it was no hardship to take Anthony's check-in about the orderly, if grumbling fold-down of Popetown while he assisted her with her reading.

Teaching her wasn't like teaching any of his sons had been; and not just because she'd grown so quickly. His early worry that there'd be no Dr. Seuss in her future, back when she'd still been small enough to cradle in his arms, had proved more prescient than he could have known; there was no Narnia or Harry Potter or Percy Jackson for her, either. It was all Shakespeare, the Constitution, the Bible, history texts and the like, though he'd at least managed to talk her into Grimm's Fairy Tales due to the lessons they were originally intended to convey. It seemed he had a budding sociologist on his hands, though she was still very black and white in her thinking.

How much of that was Lexie's irregular aging and unique brain chemistry, and how much a legacy of the weeks Karen had kept her in the Espheni tower, he couldn't say; probably only time would tell. At least she had the same urge to learn, and the same case of the 'whys' as any of his children; and she still looked to him and Anne for the answers. As much as he worried about her future, he cherished the time he was able to spend with her.

She looked up from her slightly water-stained copy of The Complete Works of Shakespeare as Anthony walked out of the room, a pensive frown on her small face, and stared up at him.

"Daddy?" she asked.

"What, sweetheart? Ready to read the next passage with me yet?"

She shook her head, long dark hair — worn loose like her mother's — sliding over her shoulders. "You think they're coming here," she said.

"You mean the Espheni?"

Alexis nodded wordlessly, worrying at her lower lip with her teeth.

"I'm afraid so, Lexie. But don't worry; we'll be ready for them when they do." He didn't believe in lying to his kids — but he didn't believe in burdening them with more than they were ready for, either.

Her frown deepened a little more, and she fidgeted a bit, picking at the deckle edging of the book's pages. "But why are you afraid? That woman, Karen, who found me and Mom ... she said I would bring peace between humans and Espheni."

Found? Well, that was certainly one way to put it; had no one talked to Alexis about what had happened? Although ... he could understand why both Hal and Anne might not want to discuss their parts in it, and Tom himself had been distracted lately. And who else would bring it up? "You're just one person, Alexis; and you're still very new at it," he replied, soothingly. "The war is not your responsibility, no matter what Karen told you. And the Espheni probably don't even mean the same thing we do when we talk about 'peace'. They've hurt so many people that I have a very hard time believing that they've suddenly changed their minds."

Worryingly, that didn't seem to cheer Alexis up any; her lower lip wobbled as she tucked her arms around her stomach in a self-protective gesture. "But she said I'm part of them. That I'm like her. That I'm Espheni, too."

"Oh, sweetheart." Tom abandoned his chair to kneel beside his daughter, gathering her into his arms; her distress cut into him like a knife. "That might be true; or it might not be. We don't know yet. You still have so much growing up to do. And even if some of your DNA is from them, that won't change anything. I'll still love you. And so will your mother, and your brothers, and everyone else in Charleston. But the Espheni from far away, like the ones coming here, they don't believe in making friends; and they don't just stop fighting. The Volm have known them for a very long time. Do you remember Cochise?"

She nodded. "Your Volm friend."

"Yes. He's the one that told me so. And I know it's true, because he never tells a lie." Withheld the truth at times, generally because he thought he was protecting them, or on his father's orders, but ... well, no need to confuse her with the details.

"Never?" Alexis pulled back a little, dark eyes wide.

He smiled back at her, a little wobbly around the edges but otherwise determined not to give her cause to doubt. "Never ever."

The door opened again as she threw her arms back around him, and Tom looked up into the worried features of Alexis' mother. "Lexie?" Anne asked, cautiously.

"Oh, hey," Tom said, injecting warmth into his voice. "Your mom's here; I think it must be time for dinner. You better go with her; I have some more work to do, but we can finish the act you were reading tomorrow."

Over Alexis' head, Anne widened her eyes at him; Tom shook his head, mouthing 'tell you later'.

"Okay, Daddy," Alexis said, squeezing her arms extra-tight. "Love you."

"Love you, too, princess."

He couldn't quite keep his worry out of his voice; Anne's lips went thin at the sound, and she mouthed back a sharp-edged 'you'd better' before smoothing her expression out into a fond, welcoming smile.

Lexie took her hand, and waved a carefree hand at Tom before following her mother out into the hall.

"Jeanne told me there's going to be spaghetti tonight; we finally had enough tomatoes for the sauce. You haven't had it before, but I think you're going to love it," Anne's voice floated back to him, deliberately cheery.

Tom shut the door behind them, then sank back into his chair and pressed his face into his hands.

Some time later — he couldn't have said how long — the door opened again, and a disgruntled presence in dusty jeans and leather jacket strolled in and threw himself into the chair on the other side of the desk.

"So much for dinner," John said dryly, tossing a bowl onto the desk with a thunk. It smelled like the promised noodles and red sauce; any other day, Tom probably would have inhaled it immediately and gone looking for seconds, but ...

He looked up from his contemplation of Dr. Kadar's quick-and-dirty DNA report on Lexie and gave John a wan smile. "Sorry. I guess I must've lost track of time. I'm not feeling very hungry."

John snorted. "Lie; lie; truth," he said, dark eyes flashing irritably. "Eat it anyway. And tell me what you're so upset about while you're at it. You know you always feel better when you get all the crap off your chest."

That was rich, coming from a man whose own mouth tended to mask a hell of a lot of damage. "Not in the mood. Especially not if it's just going to make you angrier," Tom countered.

"Ah. Let me guess, it's about one of the kidlets. And judging by the puzzle graph there on your desk, I'm going to go out on a limb and say it's Alexis," John drawled. "And what new miracles has the princess graced us with today?"

The subject of Tom's kids, apart from Matt, had always been touchy with John; less so since they'd finally reached an understanding, but Tom hadn't yet figured out the limits of his increased tolerance. Between Hal's episode with the eyebug, the spikes left over from the Skitter harness in Ben's back, and the obviously unnatural aspects of Lexie's aging, the alien influence in their lives offered a lot of provocation to a man who still referred to the Espheni and Volm by derogatory nicknames and preferred not to be anywhere near the rebel Skitters. John may not have actually been as racist as he'd come off at their first meeting, years ago now, but he was definitely xenophobic — a category the majority of humanity fell into these days, unfortunately.

"No new miracles," he conceded. "It's more ... did you realize, no one's ever debriefed her about her time with Karen?"

John's eyebrows flew up, and he straightened out of his casual sprawl to stare at Tom in disbelief. "She was a toddler, Tom. Of course no one did. Unless ... are you telling me she remembers that shit?"

"Very clearly, it seems like. Anne did say she'd heard Alexis saying recognizable words to her as young as a few days old, before a baby's eyes are even supposed to be able to focus, so I do believe it's possible," Tom replied, grimacing. "I just don't want to."

"What the hell did that collaborator bitch do now?" John groaned, jumping to his feet and pacing restlessly. "We didn't kill her quickly enough to suit me."

"Me either, believe me," Tom sighed, propping his elbows on the desk and running his fingers through his hair as his eyes caught on the DNA report again. "Karen told Alexis that she was Espheni, too; and that she was destined to bring peace between humanity and the Overlords."

"You don't believe that, right?" John scoffed. "I mean, even assuming their definition of 'peace' is anything like ours, which I seriously doubt ..."

"It doesn't matter what I believe," Tom replied, grimly, "though of course I don't. Not entirely, anyway. There's too much evidence otherwise. What matters is that Lexie believed it, to the point that she was confused we were so worried about them coming here ... and upset that I'd hate her, too, after I explained it to her. I tried, but ... how can I really make her understand when she has the intelligence, but not the context or experience, to grasp the answer? She might look nearly Matt's age now, but she's not even six months old!"

John made a low, growling noise in his throat, though his expression was ... conflicted. "God knows killing Skitters and their fishhead masters is the most satisfying job I've ever had, and I'll happily go on killing them until the last one's twitching in its death throes," he said. "But that kid of yours ... unless she goes bugfuck like Karen and starts killing people for the Overlords, she oughtta know she's got nothing to fear, no matter what's in her DNA. I'll even tell her so if you think it'll help. Seen it up close and personal myself often enough."

A little of the tension drawing Tom's shoulders tight relaxed at John's ill-tempered rambling; he might be talking about Tom's 'forgiving people thing', but way he said it told Tom a lot about John's own feelings on the subject, even if he wouldn't — or couldn't — actually say it aloud. The ebbing frustration left room for a slight upward tug at the corners of his mouth, and Tom took a deep breath and reached out to take the bowl of spaghetti.

"She's unreasonably attached to her Uncle John too, you know. Drives her Uncle Dan a little crazy, actually."

John snorted, avoiding his gaze. "Feeling possessive, huh? Ought to just go ahead and change that man's last name to Mason. Or do the clan thing, you know, and tack it on afterward. Dan Weaver Mason. Jeanne Weaver Mason."

"Alexis Glass Mason. Tom Mason Mason?" Tom chuckled. "Easier than adding 'of the Second Massachusetts Militia' to identify family, I suppose. Though you realize, that would also make you ..."

John caught onto the implication just in time, wagging a finger at him. "Aw, hell no. Eat your damn spaghetti, Tom. We got us a movie to watch, and you know Jeanne won't let 'em start until you show up."

Tom obediently took a bite, winding several slightly off-color noodles up on his fork, making sure they were sufficiently coated in sauce, and then shoveling the resulting portion into his mouth. His eyes fluttered briefly shut at the taste — he wasn't sure what they'd used for flour, and it was missing a lot of the spices he was used to, but damn, it really was spaghetti — and he abruptly became aware that he actually was hungry.

"Mmm. Probably not as good as you could make, but. Remind me to compliment the cook. I wasn't actually planning on attending the movie, though. I know I owe you, but I'm really not in the right frame of mind for a date night right now."

"A date night? Don't be stupid." John crossed his arms over his chest, watching avidly as Tom took another forkful of spaghetti. "It's not like I plan on staying for the whole thing, either. But we have a better chance of getting away clean and not having someone interrupt if you let everyone else see how not worried you are first. Mister President."

"Ah. So it's a date night," Tom snorted, letting the title thing go. It wasn't worth arguing whether he was President or Governor anymore, when Charleston would be the first line of defense regardless. Hathaway's people had already radioed back, saying they'd be relocating and might not answer calls for a while; kind of hard for a man to serve as President when he was entirely out of touch with his constituents.

John's smirk shifted to an outright leer. "Be a good boy, and maybe you'll find out."

The bowl was down to a third full; Tom rolled his eyes and twirled up another bite. "Tanya won't mind if we leave early?"

"Tanya sings your fucking praises, and you know it. And I already had two meals with her today. Don't want to overload her with too much of her wicked old man's company."

Personally, Tom thought Tanya Pope was as worried about disappointing her 'wicked old man' as John was about scaring her off, particularly since she'd been the younger of his two children and witnessed less of his erratic behavior before he'd been convicted of accidental manslaughter five years prior to the invasion. They'd only been back in one another's company for three weeks, which wasn't much in the grand scheme of things; about as long as Tom had had to get to know his daughter, in fact. But they'd go at their own pace.

"How's she taking to working in the infirmary?" he asked next. The third reason she was rooming with Lourdes: the older girl was mentoring her in a sort of work-study apprenticeship. They could always use more hands in the med ward, and Tanya had some experience from the group she'd lived with in Florida.

"Better than your next-to-littlest does in school; and you're not gonna distract me that easily. You about done?"

Tom swallowed his last bite, then put the fork down and eyed John frankly, remembering the view from that morning. He was tempted to lick the bowl clean in front of him, but figured that might be a little much. "Sure you don't want to take a shower first?" he suggested, gaze lingering somewhat south of John's face. "You look like you had a long day."

"'Bout as long as yours, I expect; and nice try. C'mon." John grinned at him, then strolled over and retrieved the rifle Tom habitually propped at the end of the desk, holding it out to him. Security blanket, Second Massachusetts Militia style: he never went anywhere without it.

"Oh, all right. I guess it's not worth fighting over ... or staying here to shove a few more pieces of paper around." Tom carefully folded up the DNA analysis and tucked it into an inner pocket of his jacket. Then he took the rifle and gestured good-naturedly to the door. "After you."

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